


Five Times Dave Says Yes to Andreas (And one time he says no)

by frogy



Category: You Could Make a Life Series - Taylor Fitzpatrick
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-20
Updated: 2019-04-20
Packaged: 2020-01-20 16:37:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18528940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frogy/pseuds/frogy
Summary: Because people spend most of their waking hours at work, and Dave and Andreas spend even more than most.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I had no idea what to rate this, because it is a deeply adult story, not because of any sexual content, but because it's about professional development in an office job. This fic is really meta with a narrative hat, and my end notes were too long to be notes so they're the second chapter. What is my life?

**\- 0 -**

"What are we drinking to?" the latest friend to join their group at the bar asks, his glass in the air.

"Last hired, first fired," Andreas shouts back to be heard over the thumping music.

"Fuck, I'm sorry."

Andreas has been hearing that all evening. He's said it, or something similar, enough at bar nights across the city to one friend or another who couldn't find a job or keep one once they were in due to no fault of their own.

He was probably supposed to figure out what he wanted to do when he grew up sometime before he graduated college and got on the job market. Then again his generation is fucked and there are no jobs to be had anywhere so it's not like knowing what he wants to do would help.

"Do you want me to put in a good word for you at the coffee shop?" one friend asks.

"I got this temp thing doing data entry. I can send you the temp agency info if you want?" another friend says.

All the offers are nice but, there's a reason he said they should meet at this club. "That's a tomorrow problem," Andreas says, chugging his rum and coke. He puts the empty glass down with a thump. "Tonight I just want to get laid."

-

When Dave starts his own agency he takes all but two of his clients, one amazing assistant, and all the responsibility.

So when his amazing assistant tells him she and her husband are moving back to Detroit where they are from to try and start a family, there's no handy HR person to find him a new one. It's just him.

He has her come up with the job description, posts it on Monster, and hopes someone good comes through. 

The next morning he has 94 resumes. By the next week he has 472. He doesn't have time to go through all of that. He has real work to do.

So he calls a talent agency and puts them on the job.

**\- 1 -**

Dave is glad he went with the temp option, even though it was the more expensive option because it meant he could take the easy out of not renewing the contract when the first person they sent him struggled the whole three months.

The second person is two and a half weeks in when they tell Dave they are leaving because they got a full time position.

Today Dave has an interview with the latest person they've sent him, an Andreas Krause, who has almost no work history, but Laura at the temp agency swears he's more impressive in person. 

Half the kids he's interviewed are just that, kids in ill-fitting suits who are so nervous talking to him Dave would never trust them to answer the phone when management calls, let alone a player. Dave really hopes Laura's right about Krause.

-

Andreas is not a fan of full-time job hunting. At the beginning of the month temp agency had him at a receptionist vacation-coverage placement which amounted to watching Netflix and getting paid for it. They sent him on one interview on Monday with the Summer's agency and now he's back to sending out his resume to pretty much anyone hiring entry-level. 

Andreas is trying to decide if the eggs in the back of the fridge are still good to eat. He read that as long as they sink in a bowl of water, they're fine. His hands are wet when he scrambles to pick up his ringing phone. 

If it's just about Nick's birthday this weekend he's going to be pissed. He's trying not to spend the money he doesn't have, but once he has a bar tab open, that's easier said than done.

It's not about Nick's birthday. It's Laura. Summer's wants to hire him. It's a perma-lance position, freelance hourly with no end date, with the possibility of going salaried at some point if it works out.

**\- 2 -**

"So, how do you feel the year's been," Dave asks. It is Andreas's first annual performance review. Dave took them to a steakhouse for it. That must mean Dave thinks the year went well, right?

Andreas takes a sip of his G&T to buy time before answering. He never drank top-shelf liquor before he worked for Dave but he doesn't think that's the answer Dave is looking for. 

The year as Dave's assistant has been good. He does all the normal assistant things, fields emails and answers the phone, manages Dave's calendar and books travel and orders lunch. 

But Dave also likes working out loud and Andreas has been a sounding board while Dave talks through the pros and cons of bridge contracts and endorsement deals and how to see potential in Juniors players. There's so much he gets to do because it's just him and Dave; things he'd never be privy to at the bottom of the pecking order in a bigger office.

"Good," he eventually says because it's true. 

"Yeah," Dave says. "That's an understatement. I hope you know you've been doing great. You've picked up on everything really quickly. I've been really impressed by your poise and confidence with all manner of people."

"Oh," Andreas says. "Thanks." It's one thing to show up to work every day and do a good job. It's another thing to hear it laid out like that. It's just talking to people.

"We have a busy year ahead of us. There's going to be plenty of work to go around. Is there anything that particularly interests you that you'd like to work more on? Is there anything that I can do to make sure you stay?"

Andreas doesn't feel the poise and confidence Dave is attributing to him. But there is one thing. "When I started working for you, Laura said there was a possibility the position would convert to full time? Do you think that might still happen? It would be great to have something with health insurance."

"I thought the temp place had insurance? They gave me a bunch of paperwork about it when I started working with them."

"It's barely cheaper than COBRA," Andreas says. "And the deductibles are actually worse."

"I guess I should probably come up with a company vacation policy," Dave says. "I can figure out some sort of retirement thing too."

"That would be great," Andreas says.

**\- 3 -**

"I was thinking we should have a company holiday party," Dave says, sipping his scotch. The OHL season has just started, and he's got a game streaming to see how a player he's interested in makes the transitions from AAA. 

He invited Andreas in to have a drink and watch the game too, but Andreas has brought his laptop in with him to work on something. Probably last quarter's travel expense report because he's the best assistant.

Andreas looks up at Dave's pronouncement, and then pointedly around at the office. "I assume you mean something more than the two of us drinking in your office."

"Yes," Dave says. "Something not this. A nice dinner somewhere. We can invite the guys from Collins Raid," the law firm most of their players work with, "and some of the people from my old agency."

"What type of food are you thinking? What's the budget? Do you have an idea the total number of guest we'll want?" Andreas asks. Dave is 100% sure Andreas has a fresh spreadsheet open to track his answers.

"I don't know," Dave says. "A dozen people maybe. Maybe more than that if we invite partners." They should definitely do that. The kids are finally old enough they can leave them with the inlaws for the night, get a hotel room. "Someplace with good wine list for Jeanine."

"Good wine list, got it," Andreas says. "I'll come up with a preliminary list of places."

Dave knows he will. What he doesn't know is if Andreas has a girlfriend to bring to the party. He's pretty sure he'd know if Andreas were married. But Andreas doesn't talk much about his life outside of work. Andreas knows way more about Dave than the other way around, even taking into account that sometimes you just need your assistant to research the best preschools in your area of figure out a Christmas present for your sister-in-law.

"Are you going to bring your girlfriend?" Dave asks, because that's one way to find out.

Andreas is quiet for longer than the question should require, and Dave checks the game to make sure there's not something worth paying attention to happening right now.

Eventually, Andreas speaks. "Could I bring my boyfriend to the holiday party?"

"Oh." Oh. That would explain why Dave doesn't know. "Yes, you could bring him to the holiday party." 

**\- 4 -**

Fuck. 

Andreas checks Dave's calendar again hoping that he's reading it wrong or that if he checks enough the dates will resolve themselves. But no. Marcus and by extension Dave just got invited to some sort of WHL Alumni awards thing that's happening during the week Andreas promised Jeanine he'd keep Dave's calendar clear for a surprise anniversary thing she's planning.

Why the fuck are they giving Marcus an award? Andreas guesses it's been like five years since he's had a public scandal, and he's been the Flame's leading scorer for all five of those years, but still.

Doesn't whoever plans these things know that the summer is the off season and none of them want to be working. Then again, during the season they're all busy playing, and hockey players tend to return home in the summer like migratory birds.

And fuck. The husband's been doing well enough in Edmonton that if the organizers are trying to fill a banquet hall in Calgary he'll probably be there too. There's no way they can duck out of this one.

Andreas has never particularly wanted to visit Calgary, but Dave is always encouraging him to take on new professional responsibilities.

"Hey, Dave," Andreas says, sticking his head into Dave's office. Dave looks up from whatever he was doing. "The WHLAA want to give Marcus an award at their banquet this summer." Dave makes the patented 'dealing with Bryce Marcus' face. "I was thinking you could skip this one and I could take the trip."

"You want to go to Calgary?"

Andreas shrugs. "It will be good to build connections with people in the WHL." Not the whole truth, but true enough.

"Sure," Dave says. "Figure out your travel, put a prep meeting on our calendars, and then a call with Marcus."

**\- 5 -**

It's been three days since he and Andreas broke out the good scotch. Dave should not still be feeling it like this. Sometimes getting old is the worst. This week has not gone the way it was supposed to. But he's been running the numbers, and maybe this is what they need to turn the week around.

Dave sticks his head out to where Andreas sits. "Hey, lunch today."

Andreas looks confused for a moment, before he must put together the time of year and lunch request. "Can we not do this today?" he asks dejectedly.

"You're getting only good reviews," Dave tells him.

"Fine, fine," Andreas waves Dave away.

They go to the usual steakhouse. They get their usual drinks. 

"I want to hire a new assistant," Dave tells Andreas.

"I thought you said I was getting a good review," Andreas says.

"You are, I want to promote you." Dave should have started with that. But the promotion is the easy part. Hiring someone is a pain.

"I don't know what your new title should be. 'Associate,' something maybe. If you want to get your certification, we can just put 'Player Agent' on your business card." Maybe Dave can make hiring the responsibility of whatever Andreas's new title is.

"But I like being your assistant," Andreas says.

Dave likes having Andreas as his assistant. But Andreas has taken on more and more business responsibilities over the years, and there's more that Dave wants him to be able to do that he can't if he's also busy making restaurant reservations for client meetings and picking up lunch every day. Dave tells Andreas as much.

"To be fair, most days I have lunch delivered," Andreas says. It must show that Dave does not find that as funny as Andreas meant it to be, because the next thing Andreas says is "Can I think about it? I've had about all the change I can handle this week."

"Sure, of course," Dave says. "The promotion is yours when you're ready for it."

**\- +1 -**

They're sitting in Dave's office, streaming a AAA game, because kids are getting signed younger and younger these days. There's three of them now, Andreas has the next five years of cap projections open on his laptop, but he's mostly watching the game. Thom, their assistant assistant, also has their laptop, and appears to actually be getting work done. Dave is making drinks. It's tequila today.

Someone scores, and they all look up to watch the replay. "You should sign him," Andreas says.

"91?" Dave asks. 

91 scored the goal. It was a good goal, but "no, 11," Andreas says. "He set the play up."

Dave tilts his head consideringly. "He's tiny."

"He's 14. He'll grow," Andreas argues.

Dave shrugs. "He might grow, he might not."

The kids are back on the ice, play starting up again, and now Andreas is watching for 11. He command+T's open a new tab and looks up 11. The younger the kids are, the less information is easily googleable on them, but Andreas is more and more impressed with what he sees in the game and with what little he finds online.

At the next stoppage of play, Andreas says "I think he's one good growth spurt and a few years of development from being a first rounder."

"I'm not flying up to Toronto," Dave says. 

"You couldn't even if you wanted to," Thom says. "You're in Boston touring colleges this weekend."

"You could fly out there and sign him if you want," Dave says.

"He'd be my client?" Andreas works a ton with clients, Dave's clients. But he still hasn't signed any of his own. "You don't want him?"

"No," Dave says. "He's 14. I'll be done paying for college before he ever plays an NHL game. I don't need to put off my retirement planning for him. If you want him, go sign him."

"Okay," Andreas says. "Thom, can you look at flights to Toronto? I'll call the team when the game's over to put me in touch with the family."

"On it," Thom says.

"Great," Dave agrees. He rolls his chair over to the wine fridge and pulls out a bottle of champagne. There's always one chilling for celebrations. "Should we open a champagne to celebrate?"

That seems premature. "Let me convince him to sign first," Andreas says.

"I have no doubt you'll do it. You'll be a great agent."


	2. Author's Notes

There was a story posted about Dave handing the business over to Andreas when he retired that really confused me. Are we really expected to believe that Andreas spends 20-ish years of his career as an assistant with no promotions or growth and then is suddenly given the business? It doesn't make sense with everything else we know about Andreas or Dave. So this is largely the story I told myself to fill in the gaps to try and make that make sense.

When writing this, I went back to re-read that story so I could get the details right and could not find it anywhere. Did I imagine that story? I thought I might have, so I went ahead and wrote this. Of course, as soon as I was done, I realized that was a Kickstarter story, and the reason I couldn't find it was because it was in my email, not on the tumblr. But it was too late, and parts 5 and +1 are non-canonical because of it.

The main question this aims to address is how long is Andreas Dave's assistant?

We know he starts before 2015, because in 2015 he's sent to Washington with David to help him look at apartments. He probably started a little before that, because being sent to help your star player settle into a new team isn't really a first week on the job task. Andreas also needs to feel comfortable mentioning that he has a boyfriend to a player client, and even in this warmer, fuzzier NHL, that's not a first week on the job thing either.

Andreas is a few years younger than Luke (I swear I read this last night but cannot find the post it was in now). Luke was born 1990. I have fudged "a few" here and also made Andreas a '90 baby here. This would mean he graduates college in 2011 (assuming four years for college). I have Dave hiring him in 2012. One year out of college, Dave is hiring Andreas for an entry level position. How does Andreas get the job?

The first option is that Andreas has always wanted to work in sports management, went to school for it, has an impressive degree, and a string of summer internships. This is not the option I went with.

The second option is a deeply millennial option. Dave is a one-person shop and he is too busy with real work to also be his own HR person. So he makes it a temp-to-perm position. A temp agency acts as his HR. He doesn’t need to worry about vetting resumes or offering benefits. The candidates that come through may not be as good (but they also might be, hiring is hard) but if they’re not, no skin off his back, he just won’t renew the contract. I decided this is how Andreas got his foot in the door.

There’s a third option, which is that Dave could be looking to hire a career executive assistant, but I ruled this one out before starting because Andreas is too young for that. If Dave knew he was specifically looking for a career AE, he would have been looking for someone with experience and not entry level. And I don’t think Andreas right out of school would have been looking for a career AE job. This is one of those jobs you don’t really understand exists until you’re out of school and in the working world, and I don’t think a ton of people intentionally look to go into being an AE, it’s just kind of something that happens. (I am not an AE but I am in a similar job where I didn’t know it existed until I found myself in it.) 

A lot of the people I knew when I worked in publishing who were many years into being an AE wound up there by accident. Publishing (like I imagine sports management) is a hard field to break into, so if they could get an AE job, they took it. But being an AE pays way better than being an Editorial Assistant, so once they were there, even if they could transition to another job, a lot of times they stayed on the AE track. In my former company, if you switched, you might be able to keep your higher salary. But that would mean you could basically never leave for another publisher because you’re being paid way more than market value for the job.

So, in parts 1 and 2, you see Andreas come in through the permalancer route (permanent freelancer). This felt more right to me than the superstar in option one, as I moved into the annual review in part 2 too. Andreas’s first annual review would be in 2013.

If this were something Andreas had been dreaming about since he were a kid, and something he were working towards in college, I think he would be chomping at the bit for a promotion and a clear career path. Almost no one these days spends their entire career at the place they entry-level started at. But Andreas does. He spends, in this fic 10+ years and in canon 20+ years as Dave’s assistant.

If Andreas starts with less experience in and expectations of the industry, one year in he’s still constantly coming up against new things to learn in his role. Dave’s agency is tiny. There is no clear career path and no one above Andreas who might leave, creating a vacancy he could be promoted into. But since he’s a permalancer at this point, the biggest change he wants is to get health insurance through work. And because the Dave needs to be the type of person Andreas is happy to work for for decades, Dave of course is going to provide it.

Dave being someone Andreas can work for forever is the point of the 2014 holiday party in part 3. Andreas comes out to Dave the fall before the summer Andreas helps David get a place in Washington. This also shows that they are a successful, growing agency with the money to throw a swank holiday party. At this point Andreas is dating whoever he tells David he has to get home to the next summer. Dave’s youngest kid is 3 or 4. I made this up. If we have canonical names or ages for his kids, please point me in the right direction. Jeanine is canonically Dave’s wife’s name.

There’s a time jump before part 4, which takes place in 2020. Jared and Bryce have been together five years, married for two. Bryce has not gotten in public trouble in that time. Jared is now playing for the Oilers. Andreas is no longer dating the holiday party guy. He doesn’t know it here, but he is going to have what he thinks is a one-night stand with Luke Morris in Calgary. Andreas ending up in hockey by accident is also vaguely supported (or at least not contradicted) by his conversation with Luke during said [one-night stand](http://youcouldmakealife.tumblr.com/post/144231301301/lukeandreas-the-first-time).

Luke goes to New Jersey in 2021 and he and Andreas date for at least a year some point after that. Luke is 31-ish at this point. In my fic, so is Andreas. In the canon at this point, Andreas has clearly taken on more responsibilities at work, because it's his travel as much as Luke's that keeps them apart (source: Patreon story "excuses").

Part 5 takes place immediately after Andreas and Luke break up, like a few days after [this random article I found on google](http://youcouldmakealife.tumblr.com/post/167004643536/andreasluke-dave-line-in-the-sand>the%20story</a>%20where%20Dave%20finds%20out%20about%20them,%20while%20Andreas%20is%20still%20feeling%20bruised%20from%20the%20end%20of%20the%20relationship%20and%20he%20feels%20like%20he%20can't%20handle%20any%20more%20changes%20in%20his%20life%20at%20the%20moment.%20I%20decided%20this%20was%202023,%20but%20there's%20nothing%20concrete%20in%20canon%20that%20dictates%20that.%0A%0AThe%20+1%20part%20is%202025,%20again,%20I%20just%20picked%20that%20year.%20This%20part%20is%20totally%20not%20canonical.%20If%20Dave's%20kid%20was%204-ish%20in%20the%20holiday%20party%20section%20they're%2015-ish%20now.%20The%2014%20year%20old%20that%20Andreas%20wants%20to%20sign%20is%20number%2011%20because%20he%20was%20born%20in%202011.%20I%20hope%20you%20feel%20as%20old%20as%20I%20do%20now.%2014%20is%20the%20youngest%20you%20can%20be%20signed%20to%20an%20agent,%20per%20<a%20href=). 

Thom is named via internet name generator. Actually, so is the law firm from the holiday party chapter. I was looking for a [law firm name generator](https://businessnamegenerator.com/businessname/) assuming there was one out there for fiction purposes, but I'm pretty sure this is actually a name generator for lawyers who can't figure out what to name their law firm.

Thanks for making it to the end of my 'in this essay I will...' author's notes.


End file.
